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ISIS Chemical Attacks Kill Child, Wound 600

The Islamic State launched two chemical attacks near the Iraqi city of Kirkuk, killing a three-year-old girl and wounding 600 others, officials said on March 12.

The latest attack occurred in the town of Taza, ABC News reported. The town was previously struck three days earlier by rockets carrying chemicals.

"There is fear and panic among the women and children," Taza official Adel Hussein said. "They're calling for the central government to save them."

According to Hussein, German and American forensics teams responded to the area of the attacks to test for the presence of chemical agents.

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Those wounded are reported to be suffering from infected burns, suffocation and dehydration, nurse Helmi Hamdi said. Eight people were transferred from a hospital in Taza to Baghdad for treatment.

According to U.S. Army Colonel Steve Warren, the chemicals used in the attack were not extremely potent.

"It’s a legitimate threat," Warren said. "It’s not a high threat. We’re not, frankly, losing too much sleep over it."

In response to the attacks, hundreds of people blocked Iraq's main highway to demand retaliation airstrikes.

"We demand Iraqi air force strikes on Bashir," the crowd chanted, RT reported. The protesters blocked the road between Baghdad and Kirkuk.

A banner carried by a local protestor read, "30,000 people in Taza are under daily shelling and the government is silent."

Local officials claimed the substances used by the terrorist group might be chlorine, though the samples were still being analyzed.

"The gas was a light silver color and sometimes left some liquid where it landed," a senior security official said, adding that "a specialized unit took some samples that are being analyzed.”

The U.S. recently captured the head of ISIS' chemical weapons division, who previously worked for Saddam Hussein. Sleiman Daoud al-Afari reportedly admitted that ISIS had previously weaponized sulfur mustard and loaded it into artillery shells.

Sulfur mustard, according to Pentagon spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis, can create a dust cloud that "can primarily aggravate but in large doses can absolutely kill" when it is detonated.

The attack came just days after a similar chemical attack in the Syrian city of Aleppo.